This is where we did our exercises
before we died anyway.
To live better, we did them daily,
some of us in gray sweatsuits,
some of us in middy blouses
if it was long enough ago
and we were female
(as some of us were).
We played tennis or we rowed
in covered gymnasiums,
or we swam in natatoriums
where the water is now
gone, even the place for it
bricked over, filled in.
We can’t imagine it, our water
gone. But we know this is so,
as well as the things we lifted,
the steps we ran, our efforts,
our breaths, numbered after all.

Is it cool with you if I smoke
this ham
in your living room, as long as
I open all the windows and doors?
You weren’t using this
prosthetic leg
for anything, were you?
I mean, I know you use it sometimes,
but right now you’re just sitting there, so …?
Are we cool?
Is everything cool?
Good, because I used your 20 dollars
to buy monkey chow at the zoo.
I figured it would be cool
because it was only 20 dollars
and those were some hungry monkeys.

This is the office where we figure out what’s true
and what’s an urban legend, like so much Dr Pepper
poured down the storm drain to melt all the alligators
like hot dogs or stomachs. This is where we keep the truth,
in alphabetical files that line every wall. The untruths
resist filing. They smoke in the bathroom and stare at us.
They tell each other their lies, make us feel
like our work will never be important.

My honeydude is no Half-Day Tony.
When I’ve reached my stresshold,
when I’m procaffeinating because
of some intense fuckery or other,
he brings me a baker’s shit ton of
flowers or little packets of sugar.
When I thank him, he says it’s all
in the homie fund. We go out
for a snakemeal every three days,
then I lose myself in lady snores
while he waits for me outside,
snapping his icicle fingers.

Prompt: NaPoWriMo (include 10 words/terms from a specialized dictionary. Guess which one I used?)